On Being a Silent Witness

I promised new content and I haven't been able to make good on that promise until now. I was harried all day with work and barely had time to breathe. I am supposed to be grading right now, but I am seeing today's entry as much needed therapy before I plunge back into work.

What has been preoccupying me today is how often we are our own worst enemies. I don't necessarily mean that we sabotage ourselves or we sell ourselves short, though we do that too, but rather we harm ourselves when we believe that we have all the skills and answers we need to get through difficult times.

I was writing a letter of recommendation today for a student and the letter required that I describe how she handles difficult situations. When I thought about this particular student, it occurred to me that she handled stress and uncertainty well, precisely because she knew how to ask for help. She didn't try to weather the storm all by herself or wall herself off from others, wanting to figure out the answers on her own. Her ability to seek for outside help strikes me as fundamental to well being.

So many of us resist seeking help or advice from others because we believe it makes us vulnerable. Well, it does. But, what is wrong with being vulnerable? Why do we inherit this horrible view that to ask for help is to be weak, to let down one's guard and expose what we are not presently capable of resolving? I would say that this sort of behavior is gendered, i.e., that men exhibit it far more than women, but I think deep down it is fairly equally distributed. Perhaps men are less likely to seek help or advice for those things that define masculinity, i.e. career, finances, home improvement. But, it seems to me that women are as guilty of refusing help on matters that define femininity. Maybe I am wrong, but . . .

Nonetheless, I can't help being baffled by this. Mind you, I am not exactly excellent at seeking help. But, I see how damaging it is in others. You watch someone struggling with a problem, with grief, or with uncertainty, and then refuse comfort, help, or just plain witnessing. And yet, without that support the problem magnifies. The magnification mostly takes place in one's own mind. Without any outside perspective, without context, and without the wisdom of others, we let our anxiety create monsters that then try to slay us.

How do you tell someone that whatever it is they think they are accomplishing by going it alone, they aren't? You can't. When I first read the work of Martin Heidegger, particularly Being and Time, I was helped by his distinction between "leaping in" and "leaping ahead." The former is the tendency we have to try and rescue others from themselves, from their anxiety. By leaping in, we take over the struggle, we try to solve the problem for the other, and consequently we don't truly respect her. Whereas the leap ahead is a way of empowering another to withstand the anxiety and to work through it to find new possibilities of existence. Perhaps leaping ahead is like being a silent witness to someone too bound up with what is immediately preoccupying them to see the vast horizon in front of them: the wealth of possibilties and paths she can explore.

But how do you leap ahead?

From Ladette to Lady: A New Moral Therapy [Guest Post]

By Metapsychologist

I watched Season Two of the British ITV show From Ladette to Lady (rebroadcast in the USA on the Sundance Channel) with rapt attention. The Eliza Doolittle basic premise is simple: take eight working-class badly-behaved young women and send them to Eggleston Hall finishing school so they can become more feminine and classy. Each week one of the girls is ejected from the Hall, until the climax of the series when the remaining ones go to a debutantes' ball, and we see whether they can pass for real ladies.

The show itself is remarkably uncritical about its own assumptions. 18-year-old tomboy Clara Mayer lives with her father and works as an engineer, and the etiquette teachers hope that she can lose her masculine manner. Becky Squire, 21, is sexually promiscuous at home, and hopes to change her behavior. Vicky Jenkins is a tanning salon manager, and at 21, spends a large portion of her income on drink. In fact, nearly all the girls seem to be serious drinkers. We see the beautiful Louise Porter, 19, getting drunk and then shouting and fighting. Francis Rowe, a 19-year-old hairdresser, has recently had breast implants, and she flashes her boobs in public at just about every opportunity after she has had a few drinks. Ladies are not meant to act that way. The women are portrayed as out-of-control, the despair of their families, and lacking in civilized qualities. By becoming more feminine and less working class, they will become better people. This entails learning highly coded skills: how to lose their accents and take on more refined speech; flower arranging; cooking; walking in a ladylike fashion; keeping up a polite conversation with men they might hope to impress; and of course dressing more demurely and prettily. While the women's former behavior does seem excessive to the point of dangerousness, the remedy of a finishing school is a return to the values of an earlier era--maybe the 1950s.

The sexism and classism of the show are not so surprising: this is after all prime-time British Reality TV (Thursdays at 9pm), which has brought us such gems as Pop Idol, Big Brother, Survivor, Wife Swap, Strictly Come Dancing, and Who Wants to be a Millionaire. It's not known for its subtlety. What's more interesting about the show is its silence about the reasons why these young women behaved so badly. One of the upper class men who spends an evening with them says it is in their blood--presumably referring more to their class than their gender, as if class and degenerate behavior is a genetic trait. Others will prefer a sociological explanation, and undoubtedly the phenomenon of ladettes is linked to the rise of "lad culture" in the UK.

Whatever the causes, the extreme drinking, promiscuity and anti-social behavior of the girls will seem pathological to outsiders. Despite the retrograde nature of the finishing school, it is also a form of moral therapy for a lifestyle that would generally seen as a medical problem in contemporary USA. By moral therapy, I mean the sort of treatment for mental illness that was used at the York Retreat by William Tuke at the end of the Eighteenth Century. People with severe mental illnesses were given occupational therapy, education about Quaker principles, and were, reputedly, treated with kindness. The activities assigned to the girls in From Ladette to Lady -- the flower arranging and cooking -- were close to occupational therapy, and the girls also received plenty of moral education. The ladettes are chastised by their teachers in firmly moral terms when they mess up, as the TV show's producers make sure they do, and at least once for every show.

I have mixed feelings about this. One the one hand, it's appalling that a TV is using people who seem to have some pretty major emotional problems -- substance abuse, lack of emotional control, poor self-esteem, rage -- for entertainment purposes. It makes viewers into visitors to the asylum, gawking at the inmates, and a clear example of Reality TV moving one step closer to an old-fashioned freak show. On the other hand, it is a now a radical idea that we could treat these emotional problems with ethical training and kindness, rather than sending the girls to mental health professionals, and it's a welcome change to see such non-medical solutions being offered. Despite my ambivalence, I do know that I'm already looking forward to Season 3, which is being made this spring.

Ranking Philosophy Programs

Sorry folks, I have been doing the Spring Break thing and therefore not much blogging. But, today my friend Noelle, over at Gone Public alerted me to her post comparing the different ranking systems for the top Philosophy Graduate Programs. Some of my students might find this interesting and informative.

In general, the Leiter Report, which seems to have become the source for choosing graduate schools has been under great suspicion from its inception. Noelle raises this question again.

I should return to some new content tomorrow!

Houdini Oneself Out of That Straight Jacket: Do it For Your Daughters

You really ought to go read SteveG's post today on Clinton's total failure to reject General Pace's warped worldview. (Pam at Pandagon makes clear the Obama dropped the ball too and only John Edwards got it right).

I am going to blog about something else: the straight-jacket of gender roles on career women who also happen to be mothers. I happened upon this article in the Boston Globe via Amanda. Kris Frieswick, the author of this piece, deserves applause for a no nonsense look at why women, who outearn their husbands, still do the majority of housework and child duties in marriages. Rather than toe the "opt-out" revolution line or other sexist arguments that women "choose" to earn less than men to devote more time with their children, Frieswick makes plain that what is at work is gender roles. That's right. It's not mother nature (the classic explanation of the patriarchy) that draws women out of the workforce and back into the home. Nope. It's deeply entrenched gender roles, passed down by one's parents and social institutions, that lead to an internalization of patriarchy.

This article is not about women who opt out. This article is about women who work long hours, earn more than their husbands, and still let their husbands crash on the couch watching ESPN after work, while they run the vacuum cleaner. My Dad was just telling me that he witnesses this in his new partner, who is the breadwinner and still has to pick up the children, make dinner, and handle all domestic duties, while her husband heads out to the movies.

Frieswick argues:

Some experts attribute this phenomenon to what they call "gender deviation neutralization." By "deviating" from established gender roles by outearning the husband, the wife believes she is emasculating him. Men largely define their maleness by rejecting femaleness, so he refuses to be further de-maled by doing housework. The wife, meanwhile, feels so guilty for emasculating her husband that she overcompensates by taking on even more of the traditional female roles to act more "feminine" so her husband will feel more "masculine." Et voila! We've got a female CEO cleaning her toilets at 2 a.m. because she feels too guilty to hire a housekeeper or demand that her husband do it.

Witness gender deviation neutralization theory in action. Marney (who asked that her last name not be used) is a sales operation manager in New Hampshire. She is the primary breadwinner in her family. Her husband, who earns half of what she does, handles the after-work child care for their young daughter because he gets home hours earlier than his wife. But when it comes to housework, she still does it all. She says she'd like him to contribute more, but "that's a conversation that hasn't happened because it's just understood because of how tired he is after a day at work and time with our daughter that he's just too tired to do the housework, so I do it." Isn't she tired, too, after a 12-hour day at work? "Yeah, but I still manage to get things done around the house."

But there's more to the story, and it explains why Marney's voice is taut, controlled, and flat, yet on the verge of tears as we speak. "My husband is from a family of stay-at-home moms with husband breadwinners," she says. "They don't understand what my life is like." She says her mother-in-law has "called me selfish to my face" for working so many hours, and the entire family is highly critical of the amount of child care her husband does, especially when she travels for work. I ask why they don't respect the fact she's the primary breadwinner. Turns out her husband's family has no idea she's the breadwinner because neither she nor her husband has told them. "I promised my husband we would never have that conversation with his family," she says. (Hence her request not to use her last name.) "I don't want to embarrass him. He doesn't want that information to get out."

Here's a woman willing to put her sanity in jeopardy to protect her husband's ego. She is convinced she is setting a good example for her daughter by working so hard and because her husband feeds her dinner every night. It doesn't occur to her that she's also teaching her daughter that protecting a man's ego is more important than defending her own right to pursue a satisfying career and, oh yeah, support the family. This is how gender roles get perpetuated.

I read and reread this passage. Brilliant! I want all my female and male students to pay attention to this phenomena. More importantly, I don't want my female students perpetuating these roles by modeling them for their daughters and sons. I am not saying this is easy stuff. An internalized gender role, perpetuated at all levels of society, is not easy to shrug off. I have always been somewhat taken by Peter Kramer's wacky (perhaps disturbing) argument that Prozac, taken as an enhancement drug, might be one way to help women rebel against this role. Therapy could work too. Whatever it takes.

"That's So Gay": Hate Speech?

Vanessa, over at feministing, has a post up on what schools should do to curb the behavior of teens who use the phrase "that's so gay." This phrase has been around a long time and it lives not just on high school, middle school, and elementary school campuses, but is regularly uttered by my undergraduates.

According to Vanessa, an elementary school in Fresno suspended a student for uttering this phrase at a soccer game and then sent a letter home to parents, directing them to have conversations with their kids about appropriate use of language. The ACLU responded to this case by insisting that context matters. I am with the ACLU on this one.

While I no longer hear a harmless phrase being uttered when young kids or teens say "that's so gay," I am fairly confident that most of those who say it are not overtly homophobic (Vanessa considers this homophobic speech). One of the commenter's on feministing's post equated the phrase "that's so gay" with "that's so black" or "that's so jew," but I don't see it. I think the proper analogy would be phrases like "you gypped me." When a child or adult uses that phrase, it is certainly not present to their mind that they are disparaging Romani (gypsies). Sure, the phrase has a history rooted in the racist attitudes toward the Romani, but as Nietzsche ("On Truth and Lie in an Extra-moral Sense") or Derrida ("White Mythology") show us, metaphors tend to become "dead" in language and thereby hide, for users, their origins.

What is also interesting about the phrase "that's so gay," is that 50 years ago, the phrase would've meant "that's so wonderful." Language is essentially metaphorical and dynamic. I think that one reason why so many of us lefties abandoned the "political correctness" movement was due to our realization that if you dig deep enough you will find that almost all speech is tainted with the racist, sexist, classist, imperialist, ad nauseaum attitudes of our cultures. Sure, WS folks still try to avoid using the word "disseminate" to refer to the influence of ideas and most of us, out of respect, but there is no punishment for using that phrase in your scholarship, lectures, or conversation. (God help us if there was!)

While we want to encourage young children to grow up tolerant, I think this battle against the phrase "that's so gay," is a waste of energy. Hell, I have heard my gay students use that phrase. I am hard pressed to see it as an example of hate speech, although the more mature one gets, the less likely one is to use such a phrase at all. Can you imagine a Board Meeting in which a member rejects a proposal by saying "that's so gay"?

My approach would be to educate the users about the connotation of that phrase and how it might be unintentionally offensive to gay people. Help students make the connection. But, to try to quash this sort of speech with suspensions is, to my mind, to make this phrase all the more powerful. What kid doesn't love to trangress boundaries in this way?

New Blog on the Block

I ran into an old friend at the SAAP conference in South Carolina, and she told me about her blog: Gone Public: Philosophy, Politics and Public Life. This will be of especial interest to those readers who spend a lot of time thinking about what Democracy is, should be, and why it is important.

Check it out!

Stop Cowing to Bullies and Define the Debate: On Enhancement Drugs

I am visiting my Dad right now, which is not a bad way to spend my Spring Break. After getting off the plane, eating some yummy fish, we sat in his backyard talking about school and studying. I was recounting to him the post I put up on how to stop whining and do something to help our students, and we turned to what the college culture was when he was in school. What blew me away was how incredibly similar his college experience was to what I see among my undergraduates. The study-aid drug of choice, however, was Dexedrine, rather than Ritalin and Adderall. He told me of some Mormom students he knew who would stay up all night playing cards on Dexedrine, since that was not prohibited by their religion.

When my dad got to Medical School, he said there were literally barrels of speed pills to help docs stay awake. He also made it clear that those who used speed to get ahead in their classes usually prevailed and their grades went up.

I meditated on this story last night as I was going to sleep. For whatever reason I have been obsessed with psychopharmacology and enhancement for the past 5 years. I just wrote a short comment for an organization I am member on about this issue, and the psychiatrists either ignored or rejected the reality of people seeking out drugs for enhancement purposes. In fact, some of the psychiatrists suggested I focus on something more productive like clinical ethics.

But, I am not interested in that. I am interested in a culture that has been seeking psychopharmacological tools to get ahead for 45+ years. Perhaps what the psychiatrists were rejecting in particular is the idea that people would seek out antidepressants for enhancement. Yet, they are generally arguing against a strawman. They think that to seek antidepressants for enhancement purposes is to seek "happy pills." I have never argued, nor believed, that people seeking antidepressants think they will be permanently happy all the time. I think they seek them out to blunt their more raw moods and thereby get more productive or at least be more socially tolerable. And, they are able to do so now because the cultural message is that socially intolerable traits can be medically excised.

The evidence of the "enhancement" lies in the goal for seeking antidepressants: to get along better with others and be more productive. I guess the hestiation to call this behavior enhancement comes from the anticipation that the psychopharmacological Calvinist critic will automatically call this "bad." But since when do such critics get to own the moral discourse? Why is it necessarily "bad" to seek technological solutions to personal problems?

What I am left wondering is why the pervasive denial that many people now seek out medication, where before they could buy it at the drug store OTC, because they simply want to get an edge? Let's admit this happens and then have a real discussion about whether or not it should happen. Denying the reality of enhancement drugs is simply a bad cover-up job. Eventually the truth will come out and we will have to do a lot apologizing to the psychopharmacological Calvinists. Why not start owning the debate and showing how ridiciulous and unsubtle it is to simply call enhancement "bad"?

Women Soldiers Facing Two Battlefields

Via Feministe, I found this article, "The Private War of Women Soldiers," at Salon. Helen Benedict shares some of her research for an upcoming book on pervasiveness of sexual harassment, sexual assualt and rape in the U.S. military. Female soldiers find themselves facing unbearable catcalls in the mess halls, are afraid to go to the latrine at night for fear of being jumped by fellow soldiers or they are pressured/coerced into sex by commanding officers.

What is even more disturbing is how few avenues exist for women to seek redress for these injuries. In fact, in at least one case a rape survivor served time in a military prison for refusing to sign a statement that she wasn't raped.

Benedict ends this piece with following meditation:

It is for their comrades that soldiers enlist and reenlist. It is for their "battle buddies" that they risk their lives and put up with all the miseries of sandstorms, polluted water, lack of sanitation, and danger. Soldiers go back to Iraq, even if they've turned against the war, so as not to let their buddies down. Comradeship is what gets men through war, and is what has always got men through war. You protect your battle buddy, and your battle buddy protects you.

As an Iraq veteran put it to me, "There's nobody you love like you love a person who's willing to take a bullet for you."

So how does this work for women? A few find buddies among the other women in their squads, but for most there are no other women, so their battle buddies are men. Some of these men are trustworthy. Many are not.

How can a man who pressures you for sex every day, who treats you like a prostitute, who threatens or punishes you if you refuse him, or who actually attacks you, be counted on to watch your back in battle?

"Battle buddy bullshit," said García from the Military Police. "I didn't trust anybody in my company after a few months. I saw so many girls get screwed over, the sexual harassment. I didn't trust anybody and I still don't."

If this is a result of the way women are treated in the military, where does it leave them when it comes to battle camaraderie? I asked soldier after soldier this, and they all gave me the same answer:

Alone.

When I read articles like these, I immediately envision how the right wingnuts will spin a story like this. Most likely the line of argument they will take is that women don't belong in combat situtations (women are default fighting on the front lines since the lines of battle are far from clear in Iraq). Women do not belong in the military, so the flawed reasoning goes, because they are vulnerable to rape.

And yet, what is so unsatisfactory about this sort of tack is that there is nothing natural or inevitable about this situation. If you believe that men are incapable of becoming anything but vile rapists of their fellow soldiers in combat situations, then I fear your portrait of men is worse than any caricature that wingnut pundits make of femi-nazis. There is simply no excuse for this behavior and should never be tolerated.

The fact that it is tolerated may be rationalized as the inevitability of male sexuality under duress, but that narrative is clearly wrought by patriarchal privilege. That the military allows this kind of treatment of female soldiers is a clear sign that profound misogyny is at work in the military: the military simply does not value the humanity of its female soliders; they are makeshift prostitutes at best, and walking pornography a worst.

Lastly, let me point out how disturbing it is to think that these assualts and rapes have anything to do with pent up male horniness. This is about control, power, dehumanization . . .and this is what being in war does to soldiers. It robs them of their humanity.

I couldn't help be feel sick this morning as I turned on CNN, which was running a tribute to 4 dead soldiers. The parents, friends, and wives of these dead soldiers will never recover from their losses. And, it hit me deeply (more so than most days) how utterly depraved the President is to keep sending young people to their death, not caring for them properly when they return, and creating a generation of war wrecked men and women. Nothing about this war is good.

Oh, the Hypocrisy

Diomed: This is for you!

From NYTimes:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican Newt Gingrich, who led the U.S. House of Representatives as it prepared to impeach Bill Clinton in a sex-and-perjury scandal, acknowledged in an interview released on Friday that he was having an affair at the time.

This is my favorite part:

Referring to his efforts as House speaker to oust Clinton, a Democrat, Gingrich said he was not judging the president personally.

Professional Philosophy: A Seething Cauldron of Ressentiment

Ressentiment. That was the theme of the last panel I saw last night that got me thinking. To summarize: those who hate others because, down deep, they don't feel "equal" to them are resentful. And, in Nietzsche's account, those who become resentful act out their resentment passive aggresively. They start to value traits such as "meakness" or "impotence," denigrating those who are forceful, vital, aggressive, and direct. Schopenhauer discusses something similar when he describes why we think those who are stupid are morally virtuous: we like to feel better about ourselves by surrounding ourselves with inferiors. To cover up this devious motive, we valorize those who are intellectually inferior and we, likewise, characterize those who are our intellectual superioirs as morally depraved/evil.

The paper in particular that I was stimulated by touched on ressentiment in the profession of philosophy. The presenter (Prof. S) proposed a hypothesis that many, if not most, philosophers (particularly in SAAP) are resentful of their perceived unimportance in Academia. Prof. S analyzed some data from a questionnaire that he sent out to SAAP members, and the results made me feel a whole lot better about my situation in academia. The majority of members queried felt they had been slighted by a colleague in the past two years, but did not own up to slighting a colleague. The members believed they were teaching at colleges/universities that were "beneath" their Ph.D. granting institution. The members believed that they had little to no power to effect the direction of their home institution as a philosopher, etc.

The upshot of this analysis was to consider how we can prevent those who are resentful from destroying the community. His aim was not to figure out how to "help" those who are resentful, but rather to neutralize them. He made the point that there are not a whole lot of disincentives to bad behavior in the academy. [How can you prevent the damage of ressentiment if it is indeed this widespread?]

I passed a note to "I," that I certainly didn't feel any of these things. "I" responded: "this must be what happens if you go work at a large research university."

Upon further reflection of this paper, I am struck by how depressing a picture this paints of my profession. I have been feeling rather restless since I got tenure. The fear is that I will be teaching for the rest of my life and doing nothing else to contribute to my field. I sometimes wonder if I should try another profession or move to administration. But, I think these desires come from feeling impotent in my field. And yet, I hear from this paper that most of the "big names" in Philosophy feel slighted, resentful, angry, and bitter. What's up?

I think a lot of this comes back to ambitiousness. Those who are ambitious in my field seem to injure a lot of of folks on their way up. They snub them, steal their work, poison their self-esteem, etc. Maybe they don't do it consciously; they are just convinced of their own right to be and to thrive and so believe that they way they are treating others is perfectly normal. If one succeeds in their quest to earn a named professorship and a large salary (by academic standards), then they have amassed quite a few enemies along the way.

My question is: are all of those enemies simply resentful? Are the bruised egos that the ambitious one trampled on to blame for their resentful nature? Are all those who succeed (by the standards I described above) Nietzsche's ubermenchen? Aren't some of them just more clever and devious bearers of ressentiment?

I guess what is really gnawing at me this morning is the question: why is ambition a pre-requisite for being influential in the field of Philosophy?

My other, perhaps more important, question is: if Prof. S's portrait of professional philosophy is true, then how on earth does anyone get a job? Do you have to demonstrate that you are not a threat to your colleagues? Do you play down your energy, enthusiasm and vitality? Do you play to the egos of those hiring you? And, where are the students in all of these considerations?

Philosophical Labs

I have been attending, for the very first time, the Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy conference in South Carolina. So far I am impressed. In fact, why haven't I found this group sooner? What seems fundamental to the philosophers here is a commitment to improving the lot of fellow human beings. Interwoven into traditional panels on a major figures of the American tradition are "invited" panels dealing with such issues as the status of Civil Rights in South Carolina, the "Relative Universality of Human Rights," and a panel on incorporating service-learning into your courses. Part of what I am taking away from this group is a lived commitment to interdisciplinary work and action in the service of liberation. Now, that is my kind of philosophy people.

I attended a panel today on Jane Addams and boy, oh boy was I invigorated by the discussions of Hull House. What particularly caught my interest was the sense in which Hull House was a "laboratory." Philosophers don't usually have "labs," and yet we should. I think Service-Learning courses are good first starts, but what many of us need to do is connect our thought to praxis in substantive ways. More importantly, we need to provide these opportunities for students.

Now, I realize that not all who do Philosophy are interested in fighting racism/sexism/classism and strengthening democracy (not even all Pragmatists are), but those who do dedicate themselves to this work need to find ways to test out theories and amend them based on the trial and error that naturally occurs when one implements ideals in practice.

I look forward to reading more about Hull House.

On Becoming a Male Feminist

I teach Intro WS to men as well as women, and frankly, I wonder far more (than I should) about how the material is affecting the male students than the female. Specifically, I want to know if they are become allies to feminism or are they sitting there, holding their breaths, waiting for class to end so they can get back to the real world? I don't know. Very few of them make big pronouncements that they are in some way transformed by this material.

However, I ran across this fantastic essay written by George Mason, who 'converted' to feminism, entitled Suffering in Silence at the f-word. I worry about using the word 'converted' for it gives the impression that feminism is a religious experience. But, it is true that political commitment to feminism sometimes require a change in consciousness. That is, it requires that you begin to look at what is in front of you everyday and challenge why, rather than rationalize it away.

How many other men, who read this blog, have had similar experiences as George Mason?

UPDATE: Here's one fine ally of feminism posting an homage and call to action in recognition of International Women's Day

Let's Stop Whining and Do Something about Our Students

Yesterday's post had the odd effect of getting me brainstorming about what might improve the intellectual atmosphere on my campus. The conversation on my campus, for the last few years, has centered on how to raise our profile, how to foster a more intellectual atmosphere, how to make clear to the world what a truly fine place this is for study.

Unfortunately, as a faculty, we don't do a whole lot more than complain about the low motivation and poor study skills of our students. Don't get me wrong. We have lots to celebrate about many of our students, especially in the last year. But, there is still a socialization process that seems to happen to the bulk of our students once they arrive on campus. I have always called this the "tyranny of the cool," a phrase which I stole from a Harper's magazine article (whose title I forgot). While many students might show up eager and hungry for intellectual opportunities, they quickly learn that such desires are not cool. Despite that, many of our students pose as social butterflies, but secretly work their tails off.

Lately, the faculty has believed that the way to turn around our students is to find administrators who "kick us up a notch." I have never seen this as a viable route to improving the intellectual atmosphere on campus. Maybe that will purge the "dead wood" among faculty (gosh! I hope I am not included), but it does little to invigorate and inspire our students. We, the faculty, are the ones closest to these students and we know their strengths and weaknesses.

What we don't seem to ever talk about, publicly, is how poorly prepared many of these students are for the rigors of our classes. Sometimes faculty just plain fail to grasp where students are coming from. After all, the majority of us are total nerds who decided to stay in school forever. We either already knew what sort of work was required of us, or some of us are just plain gifted. A good friend of mine has always said that the best way to empathize with what your students are going through in your courses is to study something you are not good at at the same time you are teaching. Those of us who are naturally gifted at the material often fail to comprehend why our students are struggling.

What we need to do, as a faculty, is start having real conversations about what our expectations are of our students, what we think it takes to succeed and excel in our courses and then communicate this message often and everywhere. This should be part of their FYS experience, it should be folded into FYS programs, and there should be on-going lectures and seminars aimed at students. We need to give them concrete, practical advice on how to succeed in our courses.

Who's with me?

UPDATE: I agree with virtually everything that Lesboprof says here and it is precisely these sorts of techniques that we all need to incorporate into our class time/lectures that can begin to make a difference. Rather than scratching our heads over why students keep failing our quizzes, despite the fact they "read the book," we need to figure out how they are "reading the book," i.e. do they know how to tease out important information/concepts/arguments etc?

To Beat the Grading Blues

A colleague from the Bio department sent me this audio file of a real student calling the Bio department's office to complain about her grade. She never left her name.
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What many of my colleagues will find amusing in this message is the phrase: "I studied all night long." Many students will find themselves bewildered by this. Why? There's the rub. I think what students count as "studying hard" is completely mismatched with faculty expectations of "studying hard."

Of course, the most disturbing aspect of this disgruntled student's complaint is her sense that paying a lot of money should entitle her to a good grade.

It's Not About Race: Where Have I Heard that One Before?

In response to a debate in the comments section of my post entitled "Sorority Evicts its Fat Chicks to Recruit," Lauren, a DePauw Student wrote the following:

Wow, never have I seen so many "liberal-minded" people revert so quickly to mindless stereotyping. As a current DePauw student - and yes, member of a sorority - I can easily say that no one who has yet posted a comment on this issue at this site has a clue what they're talking about.

"What DZ nationals did was horrible. I have a number of friends who were among those asked or one of the 6 (not 2) who left the house despite being invited to remain. These women have faced not only the horrible stress of being told they cannot be active members of the sorority to which they gave their hearts, but also now media attention that is turning inaccurate. This was not motivated by race - it was motivated by image (which is, of course, bad enough, but not sensational enough for major news outlets.) And Greek life at DePauw is such that sisterhood exists even among those who are overweight, nerdy, and ethnic. If you wanted to see a chapter that overturned any idea of the sorority girl as a designer-clothes weariny vacuous skinny blonde chick, there are several on this campus, even after DZ closing, that fit the bill. Please don't blame Greek life for the horrendous acts of one organization's nationals. If any of you had experienced sister (or brother)hood the way myself and thousands of other students have, you wouldn't be so quick to leap to the stereotypes or so gleeful at jumping on this story."

However, many news sources (here and here) report that not only overweight women were kicked out, but also women of color were evicted.

Lauren's false dichotomy that it's not about race but about image strikes me as disengenous. Perhaps she doesn't want to admit that "image" is inherently about race? Or, she doesn't want to admit that racism exists in Greek life as much as any of our other institutions. In any case, in order to clarify for Lauren, and others, that "image" and "race" are not mutally exclusive categories, I direct you to watch this short film, "A Girl Like Me."

False Anti-Planned Parenthood Propaganda on Campus

Yesterday in my WS class a student informed me (and the class) that Consumer Reports has just published a study that claimed PPFA handed out the worst condoms, likely to fail 85% of the time. I was unprepared for this claim and immediately went back to my office to research it. I am writing a post about it here if, for no other reason, I want any students reading this blog to get the straight story on this and thereby not fear PPFA as a reliable contraceptive provider.

The student said it was this month's CR. But, my research indicates that the report was issued in February 2005. The reaction to this particular issue of CR was explosive. Anti-choice groups accused PPFA of using CR for issuing its propaganda (i.e. here, here, here, here, etc.) The argument manufactured by the anti-choice groups was the PPFA purposely handed out "bad" condoms to increase demand for their abortion services. The claim is ludicrous on the face of it, if anyone knows anything about PPFA's mission. However, the propaganda machines of the wingnuts have created the automatic association, in the minds of their blind followers, that PPFA=Abortion provider.

In addition to accusing PPFA of artificially manufacturing demand for abortion services, some groups attacked CR for doing the issue to begin with, particularly because the CEO used to work at a PPFA (I have no facts on this, anyone?). What I think really pissed of the wingnuts was that CR actually called out the misinformation published at the CDC website on condom effectiveness, especially in the preventing the spread of HIV and STDs (see here).

Now to the question of whether or not PPFA hands out faulty condoms, here is the response. Perhaps others who know more about this can weigh in and correct the record here. But, as I see it, worse case scenario, one of PPFA's condoms didn't fare well by the standards of the CR test. PPFA heeded this report, re-tested and reaffirmed that they offer the best condoms possible. Best case scenario: there was never a real problem here.

UPDATE: After running this post by the student who alerted me to this CR report, she pointed out to me that I had misrepresented what she said. So, to set the record straight: (a) she said that the CR article claimed that condoms were 30-40% ineffective and (b) that the CR issue was not recent.

Thinking Blog Award

Dead Dad honored me with a 'Thinking Blogger Award' on yesterday. I am quite honored to be included in his list of bloggers deserving such an award, especially since we have both just found each others' blogs. In any case, one of the responsibilities of being 'tagged' by this award meme is you need to name 5 other bloggers that make me think. Here are the rules from Another Damn Medievalist:

The participation rules are simple:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think
   
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme
3. Optional: Proudly display the 'Thinking Blogger Award' with a link to the post that you wrote (here is an alternative silver version if gold doesn't fit your blog).

So with no further ado, I will name my 5 picks in no particular order:

1. Philosopher's Playground: SteveG's blog covers (as he often says to his students) anything from Auto Mechanics to Quantum Mechanics. Not only is Steve a genius, but he is wit and therefore a real pleasure to read. Today he is even musing on the nature of Love.

2. Only in America: Jonah Walters is one hell of a writer and cultural critic and he is only 13! Jonah covers music, film and politics with a sophistication that I have yet to see among most of my college students.

3. Subversive Christianity: No doubt wanting to finally challenge the hegemony of the lunatic religious right, A Deacon, By the Grace of God is a new blogger promising to "explore and celebrate the truly radical nature of Christianity." The writing is superb on topics of social justice, the war in Iraq, the nature of faith, and self-absorbed piety.

4. Thinking Girl: Here's a blogger after my own heart (although she is far more technically savvy with the blog thing). She writes on both Philosophy and Feminism. Does that sound just a bit too narcissistic of me. Seriously, though, she intertwines thoughtful reflections on her life and with feminist analyses of cultural issues.

5. Goldbricker: This is one of the first blogs I ever read and boy is it good. In fact, Kriscinda simply does not get enough attention for her fine blogging talents. At present she is on a tear against the same religious right lunatic fringe that Subversive Christianity is combatting as well, albeit Kriscinda is a committed Atheist.

If You Are Great, You Can't Be Good

I lectured yesterday on Hegel, and particular his notion that various 'world-historical individuals' are crucial in the realization of the perfect state (which means a state that affords positive liberty to all its citizens through its laws and institutions). Hegel is a hard core communitarian, and a messianic thinker, who believes that history is the progression of humanity.

In any case, what I think is really interesting about Hegel's 'world-historical individuals' is that they are not "good" people. The language he uses to describe these individuals sounds more fitting to describe socio-paths. They are figures who were passionately focused on acheiving one self-interested aim. His examples include Alexander, Caesar and Napolean. What makes them 'world-historical' is that their passionate pursuit of selfish aims had unintended consequences that actually dovetailed with the universal aims of Spirit (history), which is to realize the perfect state.

So, I used this discussion as a jumping off point for class discussion. What would you rather be: Great or Good? The latter I described as 'morally' good. Great individuals are not always moral, far from it. Furthermore, great individuals tend to neglect all their moral obligations to others and "use" others to succeed. Even great social reformers fall short of moral excellence. Hegel pays no mind to these details. It doesn't matter. These individuals have served a purpose in history and they are often discarded harshly: murdered or exiled.

The more I muse on Hegel's notion of greatness, the more I find it wise. For example, think about when you are hiring smeone for a job. Do you want to hire the most ambitious person for the job? Well, maybe. But ambition cuts both ways. Ambitiousness is driven by profound self-interest. Sometimes someone's self-interest will benefit an organization, but it can just as easily ruin an organization or leave it in the lurch. An ambitious person might get recruited somewhere else, or an ambitious person might overestimate his or her ability to deliver excellence.

Ambitious folks are wild cards. In academia, increasingly, we want to hire the "superstar" to raise the profile of the organization. But, how much do these superstars really add, in the long run, to the excellence of a college or university? What do you think?

Sorority Evicts its Fat Chicks to Recruit

You know there was no way I wasn't going to write about this story. The Delta Zeta chapter at DePauw University wasn't reaching its membership quotas? Why? Well, the National chapter unwisely concluded that it was due to the unsavory image that Delta Zeta women have put forward: they are, gosh darn it, intellectually engaging, real women. To combat a stereotype that Delta Zeta women were "socially awkward," the National evicted many of the less pretty and perky women from the house.

So I couldn't help but wonder what the "mission" statement was of the Delta Zeta Sorority:

The purpose of this sorority shall be to unite its members in the bonds of sincere and lasting friendship, to stimulate one another in the pursuit of knowledge, to promote the moral and social culture of its members, and to develop plans for guidance and unity in action; objects worthy of the highest aim and purpose of associated effort. The purpose of this sorority shall be advanced through the National Convention, the National Council, and the college and alumnae chapters.

And, better yet, here is their creed:

The Delta Zeta Creed

To the world,
I promise temperance and insight and courage,
To crusade for justice,
To seek the truth and defend it always:
To those whom my life may touch in slight measure,
May I give graciously
Of what is mine;
To my friends,
Understanding and appreciation;
To those closer ones,
Love that is ever steadfast;
To my mind,
Growth;
To myself,
Faith
That I may walk truly
In the light of the Flame.
–– Dorothy Mumford Williams, Alpha Zeta (1939)

It's no surprise that a sorority like Delta Zeta has so wholly perverted its founding mission; most of the Greek houses do. What is rare, however, is getting such a upclose and public look at them actually perverting their core values.

I have heard more times than I care to remember that Sororities are places for women to develop leadership skills, to form meaningful bonds with other women, and to serve. Pahleeze! I suspect that when I share this article with my students in WS they will make the usual "arguments": "well, that is how sororities work on big campuses," or "that is one bad sorority, you shouldn't make assumptions that they are all bad." I think what bothers me most in these pathetic defenses of sorority life is the willingness to hide an "evil" rather than take the opportunity to confront what has gone so terribly wrong with Greek life.

Who needs sexist and degrading young college men making you feel like a piece of meat on campus when your sorority can do the trick for you. And, better yet, you pay them to make you feel like nothing but your superficial, trendy beauty.

Democracy Matters

Sparse posting this week. I am buried under work and trying to shake off a nasty cold. I wanted to alert readers to an organization I just discovered, Democracy Matters. The Executive Director, Joan Mandle, spoke in my WS course about the movement toward getting private money out of elections. I appreciated her visit because given how demoralizing much of the information in WS course can be, this organization is trying to target undergraduates, in particular, to make a difference.

Mandle's thesis is that much of the economic inequality in this country can be attributed to political inequality. When it takes $7 million to run for Senate and this Presidential race will cost $600 million, who is likely to get enough money to run? White, affluent men. Mandle pointed to the success of a state like Maine that went to "clean elections." If you take the private money out of elections then those who get re-elected (incumbents) will be re-elected because they did a good job. As long as private money runs elections, then our elected officials are quite simply not accountable to us and therefore democracy doesn't really exist. Clean elections, therefore, restore real competition to races and thereby ensures (ideally) that the best person gets elected.

Last week SteveG commented on the apathetic views of my students, who believe that the world is not getting better. Perhaps one reason why college students are so disillusioned and apathetic is because they cannot fathom how they can make a difference. The problems and corruption seem so ubiquitous and intractable that it is best to focus on one's own life/self-interest. Part of the inspiration of starting Democracy Matters (the founder is NBA player Adonal Foyle was to show this generation how they can get involved and make a difference. Mandle pointed out that college students have always been important actors in social movements in this country, and so her focus is precisely on those students who seem so disillusioned and demoralized by a broken political system and growing dispartity of wealth.

Part of what was appealing about Mandle's pitch was she connected, quite concretely, for students how many of what seem to be their "personal problems" really amount to political decisions, i.e. how much interest they pay on their student loans or how much public education costs.

Lastly, Democracy Matters is a non-partisan organization. The desire to see real competition and real accountability in our elected officials, thereby restoring democracy, should know no party.

Cafe Counseling

Sorry to be so absent for the past few days on the blog. I have been tying up some loose ends and getting my grading done. Luckily I have a little break right now before my next class and so I wanted to muse aloud about something I have witnessed three times now. You see, I spend a great deal of my weekends working in a cafe. People call this a very "European" mode of existence. Fine. I just like the free Wi-Fi, access to food and coffee.

In any case, each of the three past weekends a man has come in, sat at a table right in front of me and met a couple. I figured out after the first meeting that he was conducting couples therapy right there in the cafe. The couple was crying and he was reading scripture, laced with pop psychology stuff. I am going to try and resist being snarky and thereby pooh-poohing the scripture based couples therapy (after all, if someone like Kerry was doing it, I would totally respect it).

What is really baffling to me is that this therapist (if indeed he legitimately is one) is conducting these intimate and frightening conversations in a busy, bustling cafe where people all around are privy to the details of the clients' lives. Doesn't this sort of jeopardize confidentiality?

What do you think of this Cafe Counseling trend?

When Was A Feminist Revolt Possible?

I have been thinking about what sort of historical conditions need to be in place for the revolt of a woman, or women, to be recognized as such? When we talk about feminist revolts or women who defied convention (patriarchy), we often assume that all would comprehend their "revolt" as in fact a defiance of patriarchal rule. It seems more likely that for centuries women could've defied their oppression, singly or collectively, and yet no one, particularly the men, had a conceptual scheme that made possible the recognition that a woman (or women) would be capable of critique, revolt or challenge.

This question/idea came to me, oddly, in a dream. I kept thinking of how many women must have taken a stand, at least individually, against cruel sexist treatment through the ages, and yet, their action were unintelligible. It seems that only after the Enlightenment, and centuries after, could a woman articulate her criticisms of patriarchy and be taken seriously as a critic. I think of the way in which Cady Stanton and Anthony rhetorically framed their Declaration of Sentiments: the had to use the very language of the Declaration of Independence to even be comprehensible.

So, what was necessary for a feminist revolt to be possible, I mean, intelligible?

The Phenomenology of Broken Hearts

I have been reading quite a few essays on phenomenology today, which reminded me how much I loved reading this stuff as a fresh graduate student and how important I think this way of doing Philosophy is. In fact, over the years I have been perplexed by two different camps of philosopher-writers (viz, those who wrote both philosophy and literature). There are those who see their literature as wholly separate from and perhaps antithetical to the aims of Philosophy [Iris Murdoch] and those who see literature as an important mode for philosophizing [Simone De Beauvoir]. My heart goes out to the latter camp.

The phenomenologists believes that Descartes' radical doubt about the existence of things was wholly ass backward. We do not come into crisis over believing or not that the metaphysical essence of the external world exists, rather we come into crisis when we put into doubt our basic notions, ideas, and possessions that we have inherited or relationships we have found stability in. If I start to actually question that heterosexuality is 'normal' sexuality or that some people are not born with a whole lot of opportunity open to them, I might start to find my relationship to the world radically threatened. If I discover that a cherished friend no longer cares for me, I am cast out of any serenity. I rarely get this worked up if I start to wonder if the wax in front of me really exists (Descartes' example). The big questions of Philosophy: Does the external world exist? Do other minds exist? appeal to me as much as the Analytic philosopher, it's just that I don't find the reductionism of science to be the best method for tackling them.

I have preferred the thick descriptions of writers/phenomenologists who lay bare the fact that the world is a public world and that we cannot escape this fact if we take the time to notice, for example, the crumbles and empty coffee cup left on the table in this cafe that I just took over.

So, yes, I love this stuff. And while I was reading Husserl and Merleau-Ponty and De Beauvoir, I kept analyzing, in the back of my mind, the sort of awkward experiences that one suffers through in small towns, small social circles, and rather incestous work/life relationships. In the past few months, my relationship to some people has changed dramatically. Those who were once very close and important to me are strangers and those who were distant acquaintances are growing to be closer. I have analyzed, at length, what has shaped these transformations.

While there are lots of reasons, one significant one is the fact of being hurt. Yes, that all-too-human experience of having someone "break your heart." I don't mean romantically, but rather the deep sense of abandonment you feel when someone you trusted or who you thought was in your corner showed him or herself to be human. (I was going to write: less than a loyal friend, but I soon realized that what they really revealed themselves as is humans, like me, manifesting their insecurities). In any case, I have suffered from what felt to me as betrayals by friends: lies, or lack of care, or cowardice. I have tried to bear these things well, but find myself wanting to just avoid those who have hurt me. Moreover, I have wanted all my friends to avoid those who hurt me too. I want to be free from any situation where I make myself vulnerable to one who has hurt me.

I was talking to Za a few weeks ago about how painful it is to try and interact with a former friend who I am forced to see everyday. Do I have a superficial conversation? Do I smile and ask about his/her life? Now, duh. The answer should be "yes." So, why don't I do it? Why do I prefer to ignore or avoid people who have hurt me? Za nailed it. Because if I were to engage in superficial, saccharine conversation I won't know at what point to cut if off. What topics do I stick to? How long should I speak to X person before walking away? If I make eye contact that shows warmth or concern, do I open the door for that person to hurt me again? All of these fuzzy boundaries are scary, and so to avoid the messy work of avoiding them, I just try to expunge those who hurt me from my life. I cannot find a way to live in to coexist with them without opening myself to profound fear of being hurt again.

The other odd thing about negotiating failed friendships is the acknowledgement from the other, hardly ever expressed directly in words, but rather furtively in glances, that they know you are angry at them, that they are afraid of you because of it. This response is hard to negotiate when you represent to yourself that what you are feeling is hurt. You feel hurt, you feel betrayed, and yet you are called to overcome the fear this produces to be forgiving to the one who hurt you. The onus is on me to make overtures to create a more peaceful coexistence or to forgive the human foibles, or better yet, to just pretend it never happened.

I have never been able to figure out how to make myself vulnerable again to someone who hurt me.

Well, that's not true. I would melt, just melt if a sincere, non tu quoque apology manifested itself. I am not a spiteful person. I don't hold grudges. I take no pleasure in recounting the many wrongs heaped upon me. I do, however, fear being hurt again. I am sensitive. My heart breaks. I do feel abandoned. So, to avoid that feeling, I retreat and I harbor fantasies that my friends will create a protective cocoon around me. The real problem is that I am too vulnerable (geez, take this blog as evidence). And yet, I am interpreted not as vulnerable but hard.

These sort of difficult human negotiations are impossible to avoid in small town life. You cannot get lost in a sea of anonymity. You are reminded, daily, of loss. You are plagued by fragment and fracture. So, living this life, when you congenitally lack protective cover, is an interesting study in the phenomenology of human relationships. Usually what lies beneath most of the fraught human dynamics is the opposite of what is presented. Those who appear the most aloof, the most withholding are the loneliest, the creatures licking their wounds over painful encounters with those who mattered. Those who seem most in control are the least in control. Those who are easy going, who wag well with others, might lack any true intimacy.

What we show is not very often what we feel.

Alpha Cooks

Ok, so its a fluff article in the NYTimes, but I laughed out loud when I read it because I have dated an alpha cook. At the time, I didn't much appreciate being cowed by my alpha cook lover, in fact, his dictatorial style in the kitchen spilled over into other aspects of our relationship. Moreover, I think it took a year or two before I trusted myself to cook again.

What I find interesting about this "trend" story is the lack of gender analysis.

It was a nice fantasy while it lasted: rather than letting the lady of the house bear the constant burden of cooking dinner, the modern couple would share the work. Husbands would take an interest in casseroles. Wives would slap slabs of meat on the grill. They would read cookbooks and watch the Food Network together. The kitchen would be a peaceful domain equally ruled by two people.

For many couples, this never happened. Instead, wedged there in the kitchen together, they fell into a power dynamic just as unequal and emotionally fraught as the arrangement that puts the female half in a frilly apron. Instead of a partnership, some couples say that their relationship in the kitchen more closely resembles a tiny dictatorship.

The next paragraph segues into a discussion of typical and efficient behavior in high priced restaurants: the chef barks, the sous-chef takes it or is fired. But c'mon, is this the best explanation for alpha cook behavior? Might it have something to do with the unfortunate masculine (I am purposely using this word, rather than male to designate a "gender role") traits, such as the need to dominate, win, be the best?

Rather than enjoying the process of making a meal, cooking among power couples is death-match. Sheesh!

Why I Wither When Teaching WS

Teaching Women's Studies is both a thrilling and draining job. I am not a full-time Women's Studies faculty member, but I occasionally teach for the WS department. One of my specialities is Feminist theory, although the kind of theory that grows out of Philosophy. Over the years, I have discovered that any semester in which I am teaching a course related to gender or race is more stressful than when I am not. And yet, this is the subject matter I have passion for and that I am very good at teaching.

The reason why teaching WS is hard is because it challenges students almost everyday in a way that is psychologically difficult for them. The most resistance that I feel in the classroom involve conversations having to do with race; in fact, I am not sure that there is a more difficult subject to broach in the classroom than the on-going reality of racism. I would say that these conversations are especially difficult because of the nature of my students' background--largely affluent and from white Suburbs in New Jersey and New England--but I didn't find these conversations any easier when I taught at a large State U with a great deal of diversity.

I have spent lots of time thinking about what makes these conversations so difficult and I think it may have a lot to do with self-image, that is the self-image the students want to have of themselves that the content of my course really challenges. I am pretty sure that the majority of my students don't consider themselves racists or sexists. A few more might admit to be homophobic. But, there is a difference between how you perceive yourself and the reality of your life. The content of my course challenges students' self-perceptions daily (hell it challenges my own self-image).

Only a very few of them are grateful for this. I imagine that those same students have already had such epiphanies about their place in the world and so my course is nothing new. The students who are most vexed by the material assuredly have grown up in households wherein the parents have offensively equipped them to reject any frank discussions about race/class/gender. If they read about a Latina woman's struggle in white USA, they loudly proclaim that she is just whining. Everyone has it tough, what makes you think that your life is any harder than anyone else's? In fact, the most frequent complaint that I hear students make about the material is that the author is just "complaining" or "whining." If they are a bit persuaded by the argument, then they claim "well, the author has pointed out the problem, but has done little to give us a sense of how to make it better."

This last response is the most curious one to me. I think that pointing out injustice and how it gets enshrined in our institutions is a step toward making the world better. Such knowledge challenges the author to re-evaluate herself in relation to institutions, which is assuredly an important step toward considering how to restructure them. And yet, students claim "but I don't want to change how the system works, I don't want to have to give anything up." Now, if we weren't talking about structural inequality, then they might feel more disturbed about injustice. If you knew, for example, that your parents could only afford one present for X-mas, and you demanded to have it at the expense of your brother, well, most likely you want to find a way that didn't result in only one child getting a gift at the expense of another.

Alas, challenging students to care, take seriously, and then commit themselves to social change is emotionally exhausting work. And yet, these students I teach, above all, are the precisely the most important audience to reach. They will be the future decision makers and leaders. I don't want to be responsible for having contributed another Rick Santorum or George W. Bush to the world. Ultimately, I have little control over that outcome, but I will try my hardest to make some impact on these students before they graduate.

Shakes Sis Steps Down Too: Sad Times

Melissa has resigned from Edwards' campaign as well. The comments from the "Christian" critics of Melissa are as disturbing as the ones I read at Pandagon. If this is what being a good Christian is, then I will have none of it. In fact, I don't ever want to hear again about the moral rightness of the Right Wing cause. I am SICKENED by the religious conservatives who have targeted these women. Whatever criticisms Melissa and Amanda have made were, in my opinion, too mild, too softened by their humor.

I am sorry that Melissa was forced by these hateful people to give up a job for which she is so well suited.

Has the Vagina Monologues Become a Mere Institution?

Nick, a really interesting and thoughtful student, stopped me after class today to discuss the devolution of college campus productions of the Vagina Monlogues. Nick's question was:
Do the Vagina Monologues actually serve the purpose Ensler designed it for, viz. to create awareness about violence against women and thereby to stop it? I think it is a really good question, and frankly, it is time for college campuses like my own to reevaluate whether or not V-day has become a mere institution. What I mean by this is, that the real passion, the political force, the grass-rootsy element of V-day is gone. It has become a commonplace event, no different from the yearly Snowball Dance (on our campus) or Fall Convocation.

I performed in the Vagina Monologues the very first year it was brought to Gettysburg Campus. It was an incredible and frightening experience. The climate on my campus is very repressed when it comes to sexuality and politically conservative. I wasn't even sure how administrators would react to my presence in the production (I am pretty sure that I was the only faculty member, and untenured at that). We spent weeks rehearshing, which involved more than practicing our parts. We spent time "consciousness raising": getting comfortable talking about our vaginas, thinking about what each monologue meant, and spinning into conversations about how hard it was for so many of us to perform this piece. The cast was really bonded by the end of the show. In fact, I formed a kind of support group with some of the women in the cast after the production was over so we could keep discussing issues facing us professionally on campus.

But, in the years since our first production, the production of the show has changed dramatically. Now, the parts are doled out over email. There are only two or three rehearsals and very little discussions among the participants of what they are going through, why they are doing this, what this means for all women vicitims of sexual violence. It is perfunctory. Many of the students seem to take more pleasure in the provocative nature of this production: they enjoy participating out of a kind of sexual exhibitionism rather than a commitment to raising awareness about how sexual violence begins with the repression and widespread disgust with women's sexuality. Each monologue is really worthy of thoughtful discussion: rapes in Bosnia, the wonder of childbirth, hate crimes against transgendered people, incest, etc.

I worry that the rush to get this production on and the sense that it is an institution to continue has disconnected the participants from the content. I wonder how much the women who perform the Vagina Monologues, particularly the students, have really engaged in difficult and scary conversations about sexuality and the ways in which they learn to hate their bodies, be ashamed of their bodies, and thereby put themselves at risk in sexual activity.

I have always felt conflicted about the exhibitionist way in which young women have taken up their parts: e.g. dressing in very sexually charged clothing while reclaiming their cunts. The spectacle is so culturally complex: it is a product of feminism that these women feel so empowered to wear their sexuality and to celebrate their vaginas, and yet, I wonder sometimes if these young women are wholly in possession of their sexuality? To what extent are they performing precisely to be alluring to the male gaze. I pointed out to Nick that on some level I see the Vagina Monologues as akin to Mr. Fraternity. In both cases the performance is to raise money for a social cause, and yet, what is really the impetus for the show? Is the political message and desire to raise money for Domestic Violence shelters the real reason for the show, or is it merely a convenient, and thereby above reproach, justification?

If it is the case that V-day is nothing more than an institution, perhaps like Black History Month, then isn't it time we reevaluate why we do it? I am not saying we should get rid of it, but rather we should inspire some life back into this perhaps lifeless institution.

Yea, Edwards is DOA

Amanda, I admire you. Unfortunately, I no longer admire the Edwards campaign much. As SteveG already pointed out last week, they are simply not ready for Prime Time. The fact that Bill Donohoe got this much play and this controversy lingered as long as it did spells disaster for Edwards when the real shit starts hitting the fan.

While I am sorry that Amanda's talents are not going to be taken advantage of, I am thrilled that her no-nonsense, throw down commentaries will remain in tact. (She promises a campaign against Donohoe!)

Most likely, someone with some guts and sense will scoop her up.

Is He Black Enough?

Pam has an excellent post up about the already frustrating racial conversation going on vis-a-vis Obama. The upshot: he is not black enough. Oh, why can't identity politics go away?

There’s no such thing as a “post-racial” candidate when you look black. In this country, Obama can still be followed in a store suspected of being a shoplifter, be passed by a cab driver afraid to pick him up, or stopped by a police officer for “driving while black.” In none of these cases would it matter if Barack Obama pulled out a family picture to show he’s half white.

I think this is what frustrates me with well-meaning white people who say they “don’t see color.” Of course you do. Our culture is steeped in race, and the history isn’t pretty; its legacy plays itself out today. That’s not said to engender guilt, but simply to say that race is irrelevant or has no impact on today’s society because you or recent generations of your family didn’t own slaves isn’t helpful. Denial short circuits difficult discussions that need to occur. The defensiveness of these vocal blacks in regards to race is playing itself out so pathologically in the case of Obama — I welcome it, I only hope that it might lead to more productive conversations about why people think about him the way they do.

I'm All In

This Feminista is Backing Obama!

For Profit "Education"

I was comforted by today's NYTimes piece on the University of Phoenix. My objection to the University of Phoenix is not wholly elitist (maybe a little), rather that they cheapen education and the educational process (ok, is that elitism?). Of course, they are in many ways a glorified VoTech school, and hence, they play an important role in the changing job market. But, my overall concern has been that they so blatantly turn education into a commodity, and this is not what education is, nor should be.

Luckily, this approach to education (and the simultaneous goal of trying to generate a huge profit) has been a real failure for the product. They have the worst graduation rate and hire utterly unqualified instructors. My only hope is that the University of Phoenix will serve as a caution to those overzealous free market types who want to turn public education into a business.

The Phone

Why is it that when you are young, you want to spend hours on the phone with your friends talking about the most minute and meaningless details of your life, and when you are older, the phone is a chore? Sure, I like to talk to friends once a week or so. And, I find it valuable to get some advice or work through some stuff with friends on the phone. But, most of the time, I get pretty overwhelmed when the phone rings . . . I just want to know what causes the shift?

Edwards Doesn't Get Bullied, Yet

I was amazed to discover that John Edwards campaign came under fire from an ultra-conservative, Bill Donohoe, from the Catholic League. The crux of the attacks were that Edwards hired two mouthy anti-Catholic bloggers, our beloved Melissa McEwan (who went to Loyola!) from Shakespeare's Sister and Amanda Marcotte, from Pandagon. Good Lord! The attacks are already coming and over something as minor as hiring two great bloggers to help his campaign. Luckily, Edwards stood by both Amanda and Melissa (yay!) (see Pam from Pandagon on this). If you want more background on this debacle, read here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

It's Not Really About Sex

It's been a week of sex talk on my campus. Last night some students put together a discussion on the morality of "hooking up." [I want to note that while the talk was really about having sex, the euphemism 'hooking up' was used. This was confusing for me at times, since in my undergraduate experience 'hooking up' never meant 'having sex.'] Anyway, two students asked a decent size audience: is there anything immoral about two people randomly having sex (i.e. not in a committed relationship)? While not a single person in the room voiced a principled moral objection until the very end (i.e. that with sexual activity comes great responsibility due to the possibility of pregnancy), almost everyone in the room (except faculty) acknowledged that those who randomly 'hook up' are ruthlessly judged on campus.

The judgment is referred to as the "look away." The next morning, after a random hook up, if you run into your partner in hedonism at the cafeteria, while you are with your friends, the look away is inevitable. This phenomena is what interested me the most about this talk, which in my opinion, had very little to do with sex, and a whole lot to do with living in a stifling and repressive college culture. You see, the judgment is really not about "oh my God you had sex," rather it is of the form: "you had sex with him? (or her?)"

A rather honest, and therefore insightful, young man pointed out that given that our students hail largely from the upper middle-class, they all grow up with similar values. My colleague, rightfully asked, "what are those values?" And, while we expected to hear something about "no premarital sex" or "don't use people," what we actually heard was that hailing from the upper-class suburbs of New Jersey or New England entails growing up with a deeply ingrained sense that image is everything. At least two examples of this "image is everything" worldview were given: (1) men who do not hook up enough are not manly enough and (2) hooking up with someone not quite attractive enough is bad for your image. What no one said, directly, but I inferred from other things said, was that women who hook up a lot are "sluts," but the converse is not true for men. So, part of this "image is everything" ethos is the entrenchment of very archaic, stifling and sexist gender roles.

I pointed out to one young man that the way he was describing male sexuality among his friends made it out to be a conquest of women as objects for the sole purpose of proving to your friends that you are not gay. He apologized, which I thought was an endearing, if not odd response.

So, the upshot of this "image is everything" ethos on my campus is that almost every day is stifling, painful and full of concern for how one appears. The only time students are free to let go of all that judgment falling down on their heads is at night, when its dark and they are drunk. In fact, what I think I finally understand about our students, after this conversation, is why they drink so damn much. Living in this "image is everything" culture is enough to drive you crazy without outlets. But, the downside of carving out certain spaces and conditions for letting your guard down, is that the sexual activity that takes place in their drunken evenings is pretty bad. In fact, it leads to a great deal more misery the next day when they experience the "look away."

The fun part of sex, and random hook ups, is totally missing. Sex becomes for these students a release of tension or a means of self-abandonment, only the cure is worse than the disease.

Professor on Hunger Strike . . .

because he was denied tenure (Globe story here). James Sherley claims that MIT denied him tenure due to racism, plain and simple. So, he ate a bowl of Chex cereal and then started his hunger strike in front of the Provost's office.

Wow. I wanted to learn more. So far I found this petition. But, alas, it didn't tell me much. Then, I discovered that Professor Sherley is an outspoken critic of therapeutic cloning (see also his Boston Globe op-ed). Critics of Sherley's op-ed claimed that his scientific claims were hogwash, and that the real motivation of his op-ed was theological.

Noam Chomsky called for a review of Professor Sherley's case.

All very interesting . . . and potentially explosive. What do you think?

Am I The Only One Creeped Out by Purity Balls?

So IsThatLatin sent me a link to this article on the Glamour website about the new phenomena of purity balls, wherein daughter pledge to their fathers they will stay "pure" until they marry. Eek. This is considered "father-daughter" bonding. I think it is just plain sick. I cannot imagine publicly declaring to my father that I will "protect my flower."

Lisa Wilson, the wife of one of the founders of these purity balls, reasons:

“I believe if girls feel beautiful and cherished by their fathers, they don’t go looking for love from random guys.”

I don't know where to begin. First of all, what's wrong with "looking for love from random guys?" Can't a girl get some play? The whole premise that sex is purely a for procreation or marital bonding is freaky. And, why assume that feeling beautiful and cherished is mutually exclusive with wanting to get some play? Lastly, can you get more "patriarchal" than purity balls? Goodness gracious: the father is the only man allowed to be of any importance in the daughter's life until she marries? And, the father possesses her sexuality?

IsThatLatin pointed out to me in her email that it seems we should have a homologous ball for sons. How about a "I'll Zip it Up"-until-I-am-married pledge? After all, you can tell women to put on that chasity belt all you want, but if the men are left to their sexual predatory nature then, well, the purity pledge seems a bit useless. It is like trying to end Domestic Violence purely by giving women the strenght to leave an abusive relationship. You might have helped one woman getting the crap beat out of her, but you haven't really made a serious dent in the problem. You have to stop the perpetrators from beating the crap out of their wives/girlfriends in the first place.

This analogy only holds if what we are dealing with is sexual encounters in which young women feel manipulated and used. Sure, maybe a few of these women/young girls pledging their purity to their fathers will avoid the pain of being lied to/manipulated/or used by a guy. But, you haven't gotten at the root of the problem: that men lie/manipulate/use women.

Fundamentalists Challenge the Teaching of Darwin's Evolution in France

Some of you will take comfort in the fact that the United States is not the only country wherein fundamentalists are trying to get Darwin's theory of evolution out of the classroom. A Turkish author has sent around his textbook, "The Atlas of Creation," to thousands of schools in France to combat what he thinks is the innate terrorism embedded in Darwinist teaching.

The book features a photograph of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center with the caption: "Those who perpetuate terror in the world are in fact Darwinists. Darwinism is the only philosophy that values and incites conflict."

While our fundamentalists tend to be Christian, those attacking Darwin's theory of Evolution in France are Muslim, demonstrating to us, once again, the thin line separating the religious right in the U.S. and the rise of Islamic fundamentalism globally.

I Had No Choice . . .

I got so tired of deleting spam for hours that I am forced to start a moderation policy for all comments. Sorry. I had to do it.

Paying Respects to Another Fine Texan

I was remiss for not marking the passing of Molly Ivins earlier this week. She was supposed to be our keynote speaker this year at our CPC conference--what a lossed opportunity to meet her! But, her words and humor lives on, and so when things look like they couldn't be lamer, she is an endless source of amusement.

Breast cancer takes our best and brightest too early. So, in her honor, I am sending you all to the Breast Cancer site, where every click funds a free mammogram.

The (Un)Happy Alliance Between Feminism and Philosophy?

I am working, and rather diligently, so I cannot believe I am diverting attention to write this post. But, this topic has been on my mind ever since I engaged in a brief discussion with anonymous coward in the comment section of this post, namely, how is an alliance between philosophy and feminism possible? Sure, there are plenty of scholars out there working in Philosophy on feminist issues, and there is a whole sub-field of feminist theory within Philosophy. But, at the end of the day, can the two really forge a happy alliance? After all, feminism is a political position, it is in its core revolutionary and desires not just to describe reality, but to remake reality. Can we say the same about Philosophy? Sure, Marx is famous for saying, in his Theses on Feuerbach, "Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it."

One could reconceive of Philosophy as an instrument of social change, but, that was certainly not what Marx did. Rather, he harshly rejects philosophy for its failure to recognize that, at base, it too is an ideology that justifies certain power structures (see the German Ideology). Given this critique of Philosophy, it seems odd that it could ever be married to feminism, which in its more radical form (see, for example, bell hooks' Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center) calls for the elimination of all forms of domination and oppression, e.g Racism, Imperialism, Capitalism, etc.

Another problem with the alliance between Philosophy and Feminism is that Philosophy shouldn't really take sides on political issues, at least, that shouldn't be its motivating cause. If careful philosophical argument shows that a feminist position is the correct and just way to act, then good. But, it is clear that philosophical argumentation won't always come down on the side of feminist causes. Hence, I am left with my question: is this a happy marriage?

I can only answer for myself: yes. But, the reason I find this to be a felicitious alliance is because (a) I reject Marx's harsh condemnation of Philosophy as merely ideology, (b) I think philosophical skepticism and argument are healthy for any political position, including feminism, and (c)my feminist positions are far more nuanced as a result of my philosophical soul. Others might not agree with my assessment. They might, for example, be angry that I identify my "soul" as philosophical, rather than feminist. But, for me, the philosopher always wins, which, I hope, makes me more intellectually honest as a feminist.

Go Global Baby

I've got almost nothing today (because I was in meetings all day), except a link to The Globalist. I attended a workshop with the Editor-in-Chief, Stephan Richter, and found what he had to say about education to be really though provoking and life affirming. His mission is to get Higher Ed to "Go Global," that is, to start making connections all over the place between disciplines, between what goes on in the U.S. and elsewhere . . . basically to transform education in a way that meaningful prepares students for our Global World.

What I really liked about what he said was that we scholars are too "disciplinary" when most information these days is not. We teach "deductively" our disciplines to our students, but they really learn by induction. What gets them going is some interesting and relevant fact they can relate to, i.e. that Robert Palmer loves North African Music. Or, if you are teaching a class on Nation States, teach the information backwards: start with discussions about the importance or non-importance of the U.N. today and then work backward to the Peace of Westphalia.

I guess I liked him because he affirmed my way of teaching. I thought I just had ADD.